Mines And Mining

A mine is an excavation in the earth for the purpose of obtaining minerals. Mines of gold and silver belonged, at common law, to the sovereign; 1 Plowd. 810; 3 Kent 378, n.; Moore v. Smaw, 17 Cal. 222, 79 Am. Dec. 1^; and it has been said that, though the king grant lands in which mines are, and all mines in them, yet royal mines (q. V.) will not pass by so general a description; Plowd. 336. In New York the state’s right as sovereign was asserted at an early day, and reasserted by the. legislature as late as 1828; 3 Kent 378, n. In Pennsylvania the Royal Charter to Penn reserved one-fifth of the precious metal as rent, and the patents granted by Penn usually reserved twofifths of the gold and silver. An act passed in 1843 declared that all patents granted by the state pass the entire estate of the commonwealth. In California, after much discussion, it seems to be finally settled that minerals belong to the owner of the soil and not to the government as an incident of sovereignty; Moore v. Smaw, 17 Cal. 199, 79 Am. Dec. 123; Merced Min. Co. v. Boggs, 3 Wall. (U. S.) 304, 18 L. Ed. 245; Casti Uero